Samsung’s Galaxy Watch could be the Android smartwatch you were waiting for

Samsung's new Galaxy Watch bears a striking resemblance to the Gear Live from last year, but it's refined in a number of ways that, along with the rebranding to bring it closer to the company's line of Galaxy phones, could help it stand apart.

Available in two watch face sizes, 46mm and 42mm, the Galaxy Watch features an OLED display covered in Corning's new Gorilla Glass DX+ glass built specifically for wearables. So not only is the screen scratch-resistant, but the watch itself is both waterproof and sweatproof, something that will help it perform as a workout assistant.

To that end, Samsung is enhancing its Tizen OS to integrate more closely with Samsung Health. The watch tracks heart rate all day, and can automatically detect workouts. Samsung's included 39 specific workouts on the watch, but six of them, like running, biking, and swimming, are detected automatically.

Battery life has also been tuned thanks to a new "optimized" dual-core Exynos 9110 processor, so Samsung is encouraging users to sleep with the Galaxy Watch to track sleep patterns. This is on top of the regular Gear functionality like notifications and up to 60,000 watch faces available through the phone app.

Samsung also plans to release a standalone LTE version that will allow users to stream music and check news while they work out, no phone required. Of course, being a Samsung device, there's Bixby functionality built in, too.

The Galaxy Watch will be available starting August 24 in Korea, with a worldwide release September 14.